My first foray into dance criticism this year is challenged by writer's block over Myra Beltran's Itim Asu. So, finally getting it published is sort of a small victory. An excerpt:
There is a lot of text in Itim Asu. In dance, the movement can be seen as the text; but this piece doesn't limit itself to just movement as text, which is only practical as there is a lot of text to deal with. Actually, for much of the group dancing, there is no text. As if text took a breather for the audience to rest their minds a bit and enjoy the dancing.
Not that anyone can get away from the texts in Itim Asu. There is a synopsis, choreographers' notes, and dramatist's notes in the souvenir programme, and a voice over during the performance. Aside from words, there is a "sound score" and a film of old Manila in sepia to help evoke the era. The historical material is analyzed on many levels, including how the validity of Burgos' account of the murder of Gov. Gen. Bustamante has been questioned, and even bringing in Jose Rizal's own texts inspired by Burgos' contributions to the fight for freedom. At the end of the show, Moreno even decides to contribute to the text, by posing who is the real hero of the story, is it Bustamante, or is it Itim Asu? It's kind of a lot to take in at a time.
Thankfully, the piece is organized into several sections to address these levels and layers of text. This sectioning and sequencing of events and the use of text in its various forms helps set the dance free of the responsibility of telling the story and allows the dancing to be as abstract as possible, when it can. At other moments, the dancing tells the story and there is no need for explanation.
From "Reading into Itim Asu"
by Joelle Jacinto on Runthru Online
Read the rest here
No comments:
Post a Comment